


Ficlet of Hardwire and Sparkling

by LunaStoat



Category: Transformers (Bay Movies)
Genre: Disability, Other, Sensory Overload, Transformer Sparklings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-12 14:41:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29386449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunaStoat/pseuds/LunaStoat
Summary: When you're a disabled parent, you can't help but fear and feel for your children. Everyone sees young Akita and assumes he'll be as amazing as his well-known sires, a familiar medic and a famed warrior. But Hardwire wonders if her sparkling will be loved for who he really is, or if he's doomed to suffer scrutiny like she has.Takes place on Cybertron during the war, long before the films.
Relationships: Ratchet/Ironhide/OC
Kudos: 3





	Ficlet of Hardwire and Sparkling

**Author's Note:**

> Iiiiiit's my OC/self-insert that I heavily project onto again! 
> 
> So, I know I've already written like ten-trillion fics about this particular OC having babies with Ratchet and Ironhide, but this one has nothing to do with any of them. And hey, it's actually ABOUT the sparkling this time, and not just an excuse to write a gratuitous graphic birth scene. 
> 
> The only important thing I have to say before you go into this one is that it rides off the theory that more than one Cybertronian can sire a sparkling. The theory goes like this: one mate of the carrier-to-be will conceive the sparkling initially, and if the carrier - while carrying - frags/sparkmerges with any other Cybertronian, the developing sparkling will take on traits of that mate as well. Kind of like a cat. A sparkling can have a hundred sires if their carrier hits it off that well. Hardwire isn't very social at all, nor does she get along with many 'bots, so Akita only has two sires.
> 
> Also I did worry if it was a good idea to have a Cybertronian baby named after a dog breed bc they're aliens and they probably wouldn't know any Earth animals. But then I remembered that the most popular Transformer is called "Bumblebee", so. Yanno.

Perhaps it was her own fault for naming her sparkling after such a strong Earth animal.

Akita strongly resembled both of his sires. He was bulky and his plating was a bright chartreuse with black streaks. His face was nearly the exact shape of Ratchet’s, but the way he stood with his chest puffed out and his pedes apart reminded everyone so much of Ironhide. The only evidence there was in his appearance that Hardwire, his _carrier_ , was anywhere in the mix was a pair of antennas at either side of his helm that stood tall before pointed, horn-like finials - Ironhide’s finials. So naturally, everyone within the circle of allies and close friends voiced their praise for how _awesome_ this sparkling was going to be when he got older. A mechling from both Ironhide _and_ Ratchet? Man, this was going to be one badass kid!

Ratchet and Ironhide’s sparkling. Ratchet and Ironhide. Hardwire might as well have never even kindled Akita seeing as she was barely recognized as one of his parents. There was nothing amazing about being _her_ sparkling; not a spec of the potential Akita supposedly had came from her. Everyone had made that apparent enough.

But there was something even uglier about the way everyone compared Akita to his sires to Hardwire than them simply ignoring her. Ironhide and Ratchet’s sparkling. Ironhide the soldier. Ratchet the medic forced to be a soldier. Both skilled warriors. And then there was Hardwire, an average engineer at best. Fragile, with a limited array of capabilities. A mecha who could barely do anything, at worst. A mecha who couldn’t even fight. And Akita was still her sparkling.

The others may not have been able to see any traits of hers in the mechling, but Hardwire could. Akita was a shy and often nervous little sparkling. He didn’t like being around a lot of other Cybertronians besides his parents and would much rather play in the quiet of his own home. More often than not, he was cranky, especially when he was around a lot of noise. And he liked to scribble and build; destruction had yet to interest him in the slightest. He would be happier sitting still and quietly listening to the music Hardwire played for him than partaking in any kind of sport. And that Ironhide power stance he had? He would transition from it to immediately waddling gracelessly with an unusual lack of fine motor skills for his age.

Yep, Akita was _her_ sparkling; for that Hardwire feared how all these allies were going to react when he grew older and he wasn’t the tough, gun-slinging badass with sharp intellect to back him up that everyone was projecting onto him. When he turned out to be just like his grouchy, disabled, _useless_ carrier that nobody liked to have around. Everyone only saw Akita, only _liked_ him for his potential, for the promise he held. For being Ratchet and Ironhide’s, not for who he was. That shattered Hardwire’s spark. Maybe Ratchet and Ironhide should’ve just had a sparkling between each other; they flirted with each other so fragging much, anyway...

Language had, at least, reached Akita at a somewhat early age. He was already saying words and telling his parents what he wanted - albeit in a limited, babytalk kind of way that was normal for sparklings -, and calling them “dali” and “opi”. That definitely came from Ratchet; Hardwire was never talking that early. Hardwire was a _stupid_ sparkling, and so nobody ever paid attention to her when she was young. Perhaps Hardwire should just be happy that her sparkling was getting any positive attention at all. But how could she? It was all but false faith that he was going to grow up to be someone he’s not. Why wouldn’t Hardwire be angry? The entire world was going to turn on Akita and all she could do was watch.

A loud ring of gunfire startled Hardwire from where her optics were zoomed into her work. It was only then she realized Akita wasn’t with her. Hardwire had never run from one room to the other so fast in the entirety of her millions-year old life. When she reached the source of the sound, what she was greeted with was Hound - of _course_ it was Hound - holding a large, fancy, steaming gun as he stood over Akita, urging him to look at the singed black mark he just made in the wall. And there Hardwire recognized the look of pure pain in her poor sparkling’s optics as he stood there and stiffly trembled. Akita’s antennas - those accursed antennas that he got from _her_ \- were sparking madly with electricity for the first time in Akita’s life. Hardwire’s spark was already in pieces before he began to hold his helm and wail. 

Hardwire immediately ran to her sparkling, the little mechling quickly clinging to her leg the klik he realized she was there. She was quick to scoop Akita up and let him bury his helm into her chassis while she glared at Hound. _How dare he_ expose her sparkling to the calamity of war? Who did he think he was that he got to do that? Hardwire didn’t even spare Hound a klik to listen to his half-baked explanation that he “didn’t know that was gonna scare the little tyke” or whatever before she turned and left him to tell the higher-ups that she was going right home. Her work for the day was finished as far as she was concerned. Her sparkling took priority.

When they reached the apartment Hardwire shared with Ratchet, she took Akita right to the berthroom and laid down on her back. There, she held Akita tightly and allowed him to snuggle into her chest, the mechling finally starting to calm down much to her relief. 

As long as she was alive, Hardwire could make the world a safe place for her precious, _beautiful_ sparkling.


End file.
